The Bard and the Diva
by Everman the guardian of Taco's
Summary: This is a behind the scenes and off camera look at the events of Volume 4 of RWBY during Weiss's Atlas arc, as she attempts to readjust to life in her home city. She meets her former Tournament rival Flynt Coal of Team FNKI at the gala she's hosting for her father. But after a mishap with her powers, and family and friend turn against her, Flynt may be the only ally she has left.
1. Chapter 1

Weiss Schnee sighed as she looked at her reflection in the display fountain of the Beacon Memorial (in name only).

Music played melodically through the Atlas benefit, it was even one of her favorite scores, but tonight it may as well have been white noise.

Ball goers walked right by the Vale and Beacon exhibit of the gallery, looking at the ice sculptures, or the live orchestra band...or the large portraits of her grandfather, or father, ...or her.

It was revolting, it wasn't like Beacon was the reason they were having this event anyway...no it was her father, it was her, the heiress. Who cared about any of the students or even citizens devoured by Grimm or worse...

They paid attention to the cadets under Ironwood who's pictures were numbered in shrine...but even that was sparsely admonished.

Her eye caught a boy...for a brief moment she thought ht was Neptune but upon closer looking, saw that he simply had blue hair like his...if anything he looked like an even greater ponce. He smirked at her suavely but she rolled her eyes and looked away.

Just for a minute she thought she could converse with someone who had been there, or suffered through that ordeal...so she didn't feel so alone. Instead she had to stand like a fixture before all these people who clearly wouldn't have been here anyway if it weren't for free horderves, or brownie points with her father.

"Impressive..." she heard someone say to the side of her.

Weiss turned to see a waiter holding champagne out for her...with brown skin and hair, and a short short hair cut. "That you've managed to stay awake through that..." _-gesturing at the band as he went on_ -

Weiss narrowed her eyes, then suddenly it donned, he was Flynt Coal the leader of Team FNKI from the Vytal Tournament...she just didn't recognize him without his sun glasses or hat, or earring.

"I mean the guy on the strings is alright, but the brass? Got no passion...no soul." he continued.

"Flynt!" Weiss said in a hushed, but actually pleasantly surprised voice.

"One and only. At your service..." He said with a slight head bow.

"Not that I'm not glad your here, but what are you doing here?" she added under her breath still.

Flynt glanced at the portrait of her old school.

"After Beacon fell, came home, same as you. I do this gig when I'm not playing in dives in Mantle. Besides pops could use the money. _Champagne miss_?" Flynt said cordially with an exaggerated snobby aristocratic accent at the end.

"Thank you..." Weiss said rolling her eyes, "Is that what you think we sound like?"

Flynt shrugged "Some of you anyway, ...definitely that brother of yours."

Weiss held in an actual loud giggle and snort at that.

"Well I didn't think it was THAT funny but hey, i'll be here all week." Flynt said like a comedian as he extended his tray to someone else who took a glass without looking.

Weiss composed herself, "All week? Gods help us all." she teased.

"I'm actually shipping out to Haven in a week or so after this..." he continued in all seriousness.

Weiss cocked her head, "Why?"

"Captains orders." Flynt replied and glanced at a military cruiser passing in front of the moon outside the large gala windows.

"...Or in your case, your big sisters orders. She's requesting reinforcements for the quelling of uprising up there. Don't want that mess happening in Mistral next." he said gesturing at the ruins of Beacon Academy.

Weiss sighed, Winter was gone fighting the good fight, her Team mates were all with people they loved, who understood. She, was all alone here, and now she realized even this new familiar face was going to be leaving too.

"No, of course not." she nodded getting back to the conversation, then looked at the shrine herself.

"Not that people here will give a damn..." she said shamefully.

"...You will.." Flynt said from behind her in a serious tone.

The way he said it was sportively vindicating. "I know that now..."

She turned to look at him smiling at her. When the smile wasn't jeering or antagonistic it was...actually quite charming, him in a type of clean cut uniform didn't hurt either.

"Can't judge all Schnee's by their cover, as it turns out." he added.

She genuinely smiled back, "Thank you Coal." She toasted the air at him in gratitude and finally sipped the champagne. "That's actually quite good..." she said savoring the taste.

"Cold ones _are_ always best..." Flynt smiled, and had she not known any better...it seemed as though he might have been checking her out briefly when saying that. He smile was certainly different...which made her blush involuntarily, and became suddenly conscious of the leg showing in her side slit.

Flynt cleared his throat and went on:"Let me play at one of your gigs and we'll call it even..." he joked.

"Perform, with you? You think I have the _skill_ now?" she asked quoting him from the tournament.

"Well...you sing better than you fight so..." he said passively before quickly smirking. She gasped and held herself back from hitting his arm, but he still winced away at the shoulder movement, grinning mischievously like a cat.

"Are you incapable of anything but sass?" she chided back, holding in a smile and...failing.

"Just maybe." he teased.

She chuckled then somberly regarded his waiters outfit, and his lines about his father wrung in her ear.

Weiss sighed, "...Flynt..." she began seriously, "I'm sorry my family...father...did what he did to yours..." she was obviously uncomfortable about this and wasn't even looking his way.

"I swear, if I had any say in the matter, or had known..." Weiss tried to put words together.

Flynt put a hand up, "I get it."

"Really?" Weiss asked looking up at him.

Flynt looked at the band finishing and readjusting for another round, "I heard it when you were singing." he said, "You sounded like you were done."

Weiss:"Done?"

Flynt:"With being one of them."

He turned back to look at her as he said it. She could tell he meant this room of indifferent and selfish people that wouldn't even look their waiter in the eye or thank them.

She smiled slowly, thankfully. She hadn't realized her voice had carried to as many people as she wished it would in the back of her mind.

"But hey, about that skill...if you feel like a rematch I'm happy to whoop your butt before I deploy."

Weiss locked her jaw, raising a brow...somewhat thankful for the tension being gone from the moment, "You won't be whooping my butt, or anything of the kind..." she said wit her typical huffiness. But it wasn't snooty, it was teasing, sort of.

Flynt shrugged, "That a no?"

Weiss sighed and looked at the gala guests, her father and the brown nosers, the Neptune wannabe walking towards her then suddenly flirting with another girl who walked in front of him.

She glanced back at Flynt, smirking in that aggravating way that, that in this context made her not help but smile back.

"No..." she said tracing a finger on her champagne glass rim, "I'd like that."

His smirk was replaced with a grin at that, the one she found herself preferring.

"No tackling this time?" he teased.

Weiss was going to retort and be coy back, but then she noticed Whitley looking away quickly like he did whenever he was pretending not to snoop. She rolled her eyes.

"Seriously though..." she sighed, "...Not that I don't want to keep talking, you should probably get back to it before you get in trouble from my father...but thanks for coming by...I needed the laugh..."

"It's a nice laugh." Flynt said and tipped the open air where his hat brim would be, and spun on his heels without spilling a drop to move on.

Weiss chuckled, "Show off..." she jeered after him.

"And proud of it. I'll make my rounds again if your sticking around Schnee..." he turned bowing again before gliding into the row of shoulders and vanishing.

She raised her glass towards him as he left. That did help; talking to someone else who just knew where she'd been, and what she'd seen, or to just laugh at herself and this "event" to her honor.

She suddenly remembered and looked over quickly at brother who was now once again by her father. Great...

Before she could move on, Whitley tugged on Jacques' shoulder and gestured at her, Jacques turned to her, and motioned her forward with a finger. That little...

She walked forwards and stood idly by her father and brother while he began to brag about _her_ and her time in Vale and how " _fair_ " their faunus labor laws were now...

To be continued as we proceed into the canon events of Volume 4


	2. Chapter 2

Weiss propped herself on her hands and knees, gob smacked.

Her ears rang from Ironwoods' gunshots.

Everything before had been in such a blur, but now that it was all over, it was as if everything were in slow motion.

The blonde woman who she'd been arguing with, was yelling something about having her ...arrested?

The Phantom Grimm Boarbatusk lay dead, if summons could _die_ , and dissipated on the ground in white and teal smoke.  
The Grimm...? Why on earth had she summoned it? Why _would_ she? HOW, had she? She hadn't made the conscious decision to do so...it didn't make sense...

It didn't matter...there wasn't a pit deep enough to fit the weighted amount of trouble she was in now.

She glanced around her now, as everything was returning to real time.

Ironwood was striding away after saying something she hadn't tuned in to hear, and the guests and servants were staring at her as if _she_ was the Boarbatusk. All except for one waiter; Coal.

He was staring for another reason, not fear _of_ her, but _for_ her.

As she looked from him to the glaring figure of her father, she knew why.

His blue eyes pierced down at her, not even offering her a hand, but expecting, if not yelling for her to get up off the floor, without uttering a word.

The embarrassment along with the realization of what had happened started to rush over her now as if she was being Broiled alive.

She put a hand on her dress so as not to rip it, or show skin while she stood to her feet.

A hand extended to her to help her up, and as she took it without thinking, her mind racing with a dozen other things, she realized after standing it was Flynt Coal's hand.

She squeezed his for little longer than was needed as she stood to her feet...feeling so, so small in a large room of unblinking, judgmental, or horrified eyes.

However, right before she let go to regain her balance, she felt, she felt a supportive squeeze back.

She adjusted her dress, hair, and brushed herself off, for whatever it was worth...having nothing else she could do nor say in that moment.

Her father strode over to her, grabbing her arm without breaking pace, and pulled her towards the door.

She didn't resist his vice-like grip in the least, allowing herself to be jerked out of the room in a stupor. As she touched her face, it was like touching a heater, it had to be redder than the carbuncle dust in Myrtenaster.

"Sorry ladies and gentlemen, obviously my daughter's more fatigued from the nerves of her performance and memories of Beacon than we imagined..." Jacques said apologetically with his honey-like voice he reserved for his investors.

"This will be dealt with in hand, please let me just see her outside where she can lay down..."

She looked over her shoulder to see the guests still gawking at her like an...alien being carted, away.

Her brother Whitely looking concerned, right before that look melted into a look of...smug contentment.

As soon as they were around the corner she was all but shoved or thrown out of his grip, and his face was nearly contorted past reason.

"What." he hissed out with pursed lips "-the hell. Is. Wrong. With you!?" in hushed voice that was shaking in anger.

Weiss had nothing to say, she was just as confused as he, and possibly as embarrassed.

"Whitley was right..." Jacques said out loud to himself more than for her benefit.

Weiss wasn't of the presence of mind to even ask what that was supposed to mean, she was still swimming in pool the recent events herself, if not drowning.

Jacques took a deep breath and poised himself before growling: "You, are to go straight to the car, and not speak to ANYONE...till you get home, where you will wait, IN, YOUR, ROOM, for me. DO YOU, understand you little-?!" He cut himself off, more due to being unable to not finish the sentence from anger, than using actual restraint.

All the same, she knew the word he was going to use...the same he used for mother when he had gotten doubly angry, and her sister as well when she left to join Ironwood.

Now Weiss had a reason to be called it, and would surely be called so before the nights end when she returned home.

Weiss responded by half nodding, before walking away as quickly as she could down the long hall towards the lifts around the corner, clutching her dress.

She heard her father saying on his scroll to the security detail downstairs,

"Mr. Cloudberry? She's coming down to you, make SURE she goes straight home...I know, I'll handle it...for as much of it as I can at any rate..."

She went from walking to running as it all caught up to her even faster. What was going to happen to her? What had she done? Everything was shattering around her like glass.

 _Back in the ballroom a few moments before._

Flynt watched Jacques grab Weiss as if she was a leashed dog, and march her out of the room. It made him flinch to see how hard she was grabbed, much less yanked.

He heard the same blonde woman ranting at Ironwood to arrest her, and some of the guests murmured, or even chuckled and scoffed at the "Little embarrassment", or "Someone's wound too tight, what do you expect for who she socialized with..."

"See what sympathizing with Faunus does for you? Slippery slope my dear..."

Well there went the night.

He put the tray down on the table, undid his tie-cravat, and walked back towards the service doors.

His overseer grabbed his arm the way he'd done all night, bossing him around.

"Hey! Surf, where do you think you're going, you got a party to-"

Flynt jerked his hand away from his arm, frowning eye-to-eye to the caterer who was only his height with heel supports anyway. Either way the boss backed down an inch.

"My shift." He pushed his cravat-tie in his chest.

"Has BEEN over. I was working overtime, like I told you the past 3 nights..." He walked by him, not close to being in the mood.

"Besides, were you watching? What party? We're getting sent home in T-minus."

As he left towards the way to the service stairs he heard Jacques Schnee desperately trying to save some semblance of the night, as guests were already starting to go home according to his predictions. Flynt shook his head and grabbed his back bag and head down the steps.

 _Meanwhile at the elevator_

Weiss hadn't even pushed the down button yet. She was just resting her back against the wall of the elevator's inside, with the doors closed, taking deep breaths, letting everything just wash over her.

She covered her face rubbing it hard enough to make it redder than it already was.

Every possible scenario of what awaited her when she got home poured into her brain, which made her feel worse, if not more frantic. What's more she had no one to blame but...herself really, right? Yes the woman was out of line, but she'd triggered the Boarbatusk, she'd caused a scene, nearly KILLED someone...it didn't matter how or why, it had happened and now her life was over.

...Just like mother.

She wiped a bit of wetness from the corner of her eye, and as she thought on that, took a breath, and pushed the button above her head for going down.

If anything was scarier than being in a small cage like box like this elevator, it was the thoughts of mother while doing so; of ending up like her.

This place wasn't as safe or quiet anymore. In fact, now the stillness was unsettling, even with the rumbling of the elevator going downwards.

She started to hum, and then do what she did to take her mind off things when she was smaller...just like her mother had taught her, before things were...different; she started to SING softly.

At the bottom of the stairs, Flynt composed himself before heading out towards the lobby entrance of the opera house, it was raining outside but he didn't care about the rain at the moment, just getting far away from the blast radius of this place.

As he passed the elevator's he heard a familiar and angelic voice, softly singing from behind one of the doors. He paused.

The Elevator doors with snow flake patterns across them, opened as the song was just ending on the lips of Weiss Schnee, who's cheeks were wet.

"Schnee?" Flynt said in surprise.

Weiss blinked just as surprised at the sight of him, but was still too shell-shocked for anything more than that.

Her face was like someone about to be lead to the gallows.

"You...gonna be alright?" He found himself saying. _What a stupid question, why on earth did he ask that...?_ He thought to himself.

Weiss shook her head robotically. Down the hall from the elevators, and down the stairs to the lobby, were the Atlasian Knights and security were waiting to escort her to her car.

A few guests and millers were idling about on their scrolls getting caught up on the latest faux pas Weiss had committed.

She hugged her arms and walked passed him.

This isn't your problem, he told himself, Come on Coal, it's not your affair, what could really happen to her that's so bad, hell how could you make her feel better? You have bigger worries on your plate...

All the same he found himself following her, parallel to her stride.

He had no idea what he should do, or why he was even trying. But like with soul in his music, he was going full with his gut on this, and right now his gut was telling him to keep up with her.

"Hey..." he found himself saying, putting a hand on her shoulder.

He regretted it immediately after doing so, but she didn't recoil and actually stopped in her tracks. Still looking at her feet, she stood there, looking ashamed and lost.

"What...?" She asked hollowly.

Flynt blew out some air and spun her around gently to look at him. She didn't resist and sniffed as she glanced up at him with wet eyes, and a blank expression.

"It's just...don't let em get to you." He finally said. "Of all people..."

Weiss blinked a tear a way and sniffled and still said nothing.

He offered her his handkerchief from work, and she took it thankfully and stiffly. He sighed again and saw what else would come out his mouth.

"Regardless of that Borbatusk being a bit extra, everything you said in there was right Schnee, don't let em use that to make you ashamed of speaking up..."

That seemed to resonate so he continued, "Forget what they say Schnee, you're better than that. There ain't a person up there who gets what we saw..."

That certainly resonated with her. It struck him now how while he had his team and family to return to, if her family was like how the tabloids and gossip said, or at the very least like her old man...she was in bad shape in terms of closure.

He somewhat tightened his grip on her shoulder supportively, again just going with it, and said honestly, "You're still the gutsiest, rad, most decent Schnee heiress to come out'a this place..."

Weiss's chest heaved again once, with shaky breath. Flynt didn't _think_ that was bad at least...

"You'd make that zany of yours team proud if they saw you..." He finally offered, not sure what else to say.

Whatever he would've said next was interrupted as she suddenly hugged him, out of the blue.

He blinked and found himself hugging her back, looking over her shoulder to make sure no one was coming.

Weiss just breathed out against him, letting all the stress and anxiety melt away, physically cooling down in his arms. He had no idea how much she needed to hear that...

From where Flynt was concerned, why did she do that, hell why was he doing this back? Sure, she smelled good...frankly very good, and hugging her was nice to put it lightly...but how did they get here?

Flynt was about to say something else but then heard from around the corner, "I don't know sir, she should've been here by now. Yes sir. See if she's waiting by the elevators."

That was Mr. Cloudberry, she knew. She let go of Flynt and fixed her long side-pony tail out of her face. "I have to go..." she whispered, almost apologetically.

The look she gave him was thankful however, and it made him feel accomplished somehow; the way you are after a gig you play at a club that goes better than you thought it would go.

He saluted two fingers at her as she left, "Keep it real." He said after her, backing up.

She picked up her dress and walked on to meet the security men just getting to the top of the steps. One of them looked from her to him, then shook their head as if it was a ridiculous idea. Not to far off really.

They descended the stairs and headed outside to the car. As the doors shut, Flynt blew out some air into his hands that were cupped over his face, and he slid down a wall he backed up against.

He stared up at the snow patterned ceiling above him in the hallway, only hearing elevator lobby music on the speakers.

"Damn...what the hell just happened?" He said in a daze himself.

 _ **To be continued onto the canon events of Volume 4**_


End file.
